Monday, May 12, 2014

TWINS' BABY DEDICATION: BEHIND THE SCENES

In my head, there was a way this morning would have gone. I think it was a cross between loosely resembling the best-case reality and absolute delusion. Here's a bit of how it played out in my mind.

The night before, I would lay out the outfits that I had lovingly selected for each of my family members to wear the next morning. I would make ahead sippy cups and get bags ready. I would set the alarm for the morning, and then wake up when it went off in plenty of time to get everyone ready to go. I would have told all of our in-town family what was happening that morning.We would arrive on time to the event and be ready to go. I would have told the girls exactly what was happening, so that they were mentally prepared to go stand on the stage. We would have trooped up when we were supposed to and stood there calmly, smiling at the congregation. I would have gotten to hear the verses and the prayers and soak in the joy of being able to dedicate our children to the Lord.

I know that from the tone of this, you can all easily assume that this alter-reality bears very little resemblance to what actually happened.

Here's how it actually went down. We wake up to William crying about 50 minutes before we are supposed to be at church. There is one wet bed and many tears accompanying it. John and I take super fast showers and throw clothes on ourselves, hoping for the best. We start to get children ready, and there is some screaming and teeth gnashing, because why wouldn't there be?.?

I realize that we never told Rachel that the babies were going to be dedicated this morning and frantically text her. Gran Gran arrives in the middle of this and begins to help us get our act together. We are making drinks and grabbing granola bars, and I don't think the babies got breakfast. We load into the car and make it to the church parking lot about 10 minutes after we were supposed to be inside. As we get everyone out of the car, we realize that there is one really stinky diaper that had just been fresh.

We do the practice on the stage, but William and I are the only ones that make it up there for this round. When I get back to our chairs, I break it to the girls that the next time, they will have to come onto stage. Cue tears. And whining. I start making donut promises and tears miraculously dry up. There are requests for sprinkles, and I am willing to promise anything to get them to walk up there without wailing.

When the time comes, we do all make it onto the stage and stand in sort of the right spot. I barely heard one word of the entire thing, because I was so focused on getting my little friends to not do anything too distracting.

William's too-loose shoes fall off, and Bella retrieves them. Lily spends some time waving around a wipe like she is expecting a bull to run through it. Violet coos and stays in perpetual motion. William keeps trying to get Bella's hair. It comes time for the prayer, and I wisely kept my eyes open, because I knew that the people I was working with were little loose canons. At that moment, Bella lifted her dress to her waist and began to twirl.

Awesome.

After the prayer, we were mercifully able to get off of the stage. I rallied everyone for a picture by continuing to dangle the donut treat.

Even the donut promise couldn't capture smiles for the second picture - Lily said her teeth hurt.

So, in case you ever see pictures of our family or see us out and about and labor under the impression that we have it all together - let this blog post be a reminder that pictures can be deceiving. It is a three-ring circus that is barely contained most moments and ready to fly off the rails at any time.

I am so thankful for our church family and knowing that we are not in this parent thing alone. It was great to be able to see all of those people pray for our family and know that God will continue to work in and with us.